Chapter 9

Jack was staring out his window, thoughts of Martha were disturbed when Peter spoke.

"Looking for the birdies?" Peter joked. Jack turned around and smiled.

"Sorry mate." Peter gestured over to the stewardess at the front of the aisle, she was handing out drinks whilst looking at Jack.

"I think she likes you." Peter whispered. "She hasn't managed to take her eyes off you for a minute ever since she came out with the trolley." Peter laughed. Jack looked over at her, he couldn't even think about being with another woman right now, not with Martha still on the brain. "She's quite nice Jack." Peter nudged him. "You should go for it." He winked. Jack gave a friendly smile and turned back around to face the window, and to resume with his thoughts of Martha. Peter sighed. He knew that Jack was still going to be a little upset, but he didn't think he'd be acting like this.

"Come on mate, you two weren't even together. She was engaged to someone else!" Peter couldn't help but saying it, Jack was turning to be a real bore for him. Jack turned around sharply. He couldn't believe what Peter had just said.

"She'd told Dave that she didn't want to go ahead with it, she called the wedding off." Jack got out of his seat and walked past Peter. "Going to the loo." He muttered. He didn't need Peter talking about the fact that him and Martha weren't together, and that she might not even have loved him, it was already taking over his thoughts. There was nothing more he regretted than not telling Martha earlier, maybe things would have been different, maybe her response would have been different. He couldn't help thinking that the situation they were in could have influenced her reply, and if it was true, then he was making a very big fool of himself, and clinging onto a lie. He had walked way past the toilets, and was now near the front of the plane. He sighed and started walking back to his seat, he hadn't really needed the loo, just a walk. On his way back, he was again distracted by his thoughts and he bumped into a stewardess.

"Sorry.." He said, looking up at the stewardess. 'It's the same one that's been looking at me.' Jack thought. He looked at her. She had a very pretty smile, and big wide eyes.

"Hey" She smiled. "It's okay." Jack didn't know what to say, so he just smiled. "My name is Alice." She said, putting out her hand, smiling.

"Jack." He shook her hand.

"So do you live in Sydney?" She asked, making friendly conversation.

"Erm, no, I'm going on business. How about you?"

"Nah, I'm going on business too!" She laughed. "It's kinda my job. So what do you do?" She enquired.

"I'm a cop." He said. Fortunately, their conversation had to be drawn to an end due to Alice's duties.

"I'm sorry, I know this may seem weird, and I honestly don't normally do this, but can I give you my number?" Jack looked shocked. He hadn't been given a number in, ages! He hadn't normally let a girl get this far. When he noticed someone checking him out, which was quite regularly due to obvious reasons, he would normally find an excuse to leave the situation, or hint majorly that he wasn't interested in the most polite way, but this time he found himself smiling, ready to accept the number.

Jack sat down next to Peter, feeling guilty about the woman's number in his pocket. He wasn't going to ring her, so why had he accepted the number? He knew that he should move on from Martha, after all he wasn't even sure if she'd felt the same way, but having Alice's number in his pocket made him feel guilty. Jack decided that it was best to make conversation with Peter, as he didn't want these thoughts continuing to round his mind.

"So, what's going on with this investigation?" Jack asked.

"Well, we're not completely sure." Peter explained. "We've had some reports that some people are being kidnapped and held against their will at a large house in Sydney. The person who reported this lived in the house, helping out with the controlling of the guests. We didn't have chance to ask the man a lot of questions, as he was murdered a few days after he came to the police station. So you better watch out, the leader, Trevor, could be a very dangerous man." Jack nodded.

"So, what do you want me to do, just find out stuff?" Jack asked.

"Yes, your first priority is to find out why he does this, and then to make sure that the guests are okay. According to the witness, they don't usually plan to harm them, however Trevor has recently talked about taking different actions towards their newest guest." Jack nodded as he listened to his schedule for the next few weeks.